It has been so long since I tested this pattern that I’ve kind of forgotten about it as it’s been too hot to wear it, but now it’s been released I’ve been bathed in a nostalgic glow. The Cookie Knit Shirt by Savage Coco Patterns is a kind of 1970s throwback without the big collar or figure hugging angst. The pattern is described as follows:
The Cookie Knit Shirt sewing pattern is a knit version of the classic button-down dress shirt, with a dash of easy living thrown in! Featuring full length sleeves into 2” cuffs, a looser fit through the body and a twist on the classic collar to achieve perfect collar points every time. And with a cut-on front button placket, it’s easy to achieve a clean interior finish. Designed specifically for today’s easy care knits, the Cookie Knit Shirt can be sewn on a straight stitch machine. Life’s hectic enough, you deserve a Cookie!
I don’t think I need to say more except that it has a size range of 32″ – 58″ bust which should suit most sewists.
I used some really beautiful cotton knit that I bought a few years ago at Tessuti in Sydney. Having bought it, I couldn’t work out what to do with it, until the Cookie knit shirt pattern came along.
At some point I felt that having the stripes all going in the same direction would be boring, so I chose to cut the fronts on the bias. This was a great idea, except I completely messed up the pattern matching and had to sew an extra strip down the front in an attempt to distract the eyes. It didn’t work, but I can live with it!
I really like the shape of the bodice. It hangs really nicely and is figure skimming without clinging. You can hide a multitude of sins under this shirt!
I can’t remember what size I made – I’d have to check my pattern, but I made no changes, and the fit is not too bad – except for the length of the arms. You can see in these photos how long they are!
I sent the test photos through to Coco with some puzzlement – had my sleeves grown? I was certain that I hadn’t done anything weird when I cut them out, although the pattern instructions did say to check sleeve length, which I hadn’t done, naturally!
Clearly I couldn’t live with the sleeves, so I took the cuffs off and cut off quite a lot, redid the placket and sewed the cuffs back on. Much better, although I do think they are growing!! Apparently I am not suffering from really short arm syndrome; according to Coco there was an incorrect measurement in the cap when it transferred into the grading program. This has obviously been rectified now, but, although my sleeves are now shorter, I do have some drag lines at the top of the sleeves from the longer cap. Nothing I can’t live with and I’m not removing the sleeves to sort it out!
I wore this shirt all day as it was a bit cooler and noticed that, as the day wore on, the stripes began to pucker. You can see this clearly in this photograph, as well as the slightly strange sleeve head. I must have worked hard to fit all that extra fabric into the armscye!
There is a fairly pronounced high low hem on the shirt, and I decided to wear it with leggings to emphasise this feature.
I fiddled around with the topstitching and in the end I went with hand picked top stitching. I can’t believe how much I enjoyed doing this and I will be doing it more often. On this soft knit, it enabled the topstitching to be more of a feature.
I am looking forward to some cooler weather to make another one of these. In a plain colour it would be a useful wardrobe staple, and in something more interesting it could really be a wardrobe highlight.
An update: I have never before received a gift for pattern testing and was blown away by this lovely tin of cookies. So appropriate, so thoughtful, and so delicious!
